TROUT "SLABS"

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 134, 4 December 1930, Page 19

TROUT "SLABS"

HEART DISEASE THEORY

(By Telegraph.) (Special to "The Evening Post.") CHBISTCHUBCH, This Day. ' Investigations have been carried out by the Besearch Committee of the Canterbury Acclimatisation. . Society concerning tho cause of heart . disease among trout, but as yet no deiinite theory has been formed. Questioned regarding tho Blenheim report of heart disease among tho iish in the Wairau' Biver, Mr. D. Irope, the North Canterbury Acclimatisation Society's curator, said to-day that the fact that trout suffered from heart disease was a new discovery. "Although it is stated that old age or lack of food brings on tho disease," said Mr. Hope, "I do not think that it would be brought on in all cases. The subject will have to'be more thoroughly investigated before anything definite is known." Professor Pcreival, who for some time past has been making a study of trout and conducting extensive research, work, said that the work was at present in the experimental stage. Many fishermen did not know a "slab" from a poor-conditioned • fish. A great deal of the dissatisfaction caused by the presence of so-called "slabs" in certain waters was due to the fact that in some rivers the fish spawned late, and when caught had not had time to recover from spawning.